Microsoft cooks up, surely cocks up, Windows 9

Microsoft is set to announce what it will be doing with Windows 9, codenamed Threshold at the BUILD developer conference in April 2014.

Build will hit just weeks after Microsoft completes its corporate reorganisation and is likely to concentrate on Windows Phone and Xbox.

But according to Winsupersite, Vole is going to announce its plans for “Threshold”.

Needless to say, Threshold will see the return of the Start menu and the ability to run Metro-style apps on the desktop alongside desktop applications.

Vole has had some serious problems convincing the world that Windows 8 was a good idea Windows 8.1, which is a substantial and free upgrade with major improvements over the original release, is only being used on 25 million PCs.

Part of Microsoft’s problem was that it moved too fast to set up a version of Windows which could be used across mobile stuff and PCs. In emphasising mobile use, it put off its core PC base. Now the OS is being seen as Vista without the charm.

Word on the super information strasse is that Vole is even considering dropping the Windows 8 name and will brand the next Windows 8 upgrade as Windows 9.

Threshold is going to be a little more long term in the planning and Vole wants to generate something a little more exciting than “it is not Windows 8″.

Microsoft is expected to begin development on Threshold at the end of April so any announcement at BUILD will just be a firming up which features it intends to deliver in this release. The real realease will be April 2015.

Vole will claim that Windows 9 wouldn’t have been possible without the important “foundational work” – read cockup – it had done first with Windows 8, but this is what it said with Windows 7 and Windows Vista. However, it does mean that Windows 8 has set back Microsoft, and Windows, by years, and possibly for good.

Whatever happens, the release of Windows 9, in whatever form it is delivered, could make or break Microsoft.